Jobs
Jobs are the activity of economic production, also called employment or work. Job talk stretches to growth, propsperity, financial responsibility. Jobs impact upon the budget, departments and finances. Job mentions can not be understood to mean more jobs for city-employees, public workers and firefighters. Top job in the city, the Mayor's job. Pittsburgh was not able to Fire Mayor Murphy. At the November 2005 election, Pittsburgh hired a new mayor, Bob O'Connor, after 12 years of Tom Murphy as mayor. Background * Pennsylvania's change to the minimum wage in 2006 is the first in nine years. Congress raised the federal minimum wage to $5.15 an hour. Since then, 21 states and Washington, D.C., have raised their minimum wage. About 423,000 workers in Pennsylvania make between $5.15 and $7.14 an hour, but it is not clear how many of those work for businesses with the equivalent of 10 or fewer full-time employees, according to the state Department of Labor and Industry. Details A PA bill passed by the PA House in April 2006 to increase the minimum wage to $7.15 an hour. In July, 2006, the state House of Representatives endorsed a compromise plan to raise Pennsylvania's minimum wage by $2 per hour in 2007 but allow some small businesses to wait two years before paying employees $7.15 an hour. The measure passed 161-37. The PA Senate is expected to approve minor changes made by the House before the bill goes to Gov. Ed Rendell for his signature, expected in July, 2006. Pennsylvania's minimum wage moves to $6.25 an hour on 1-1-2007, then to $7.15 an hour on July 1, 2007. The new exemption slows the increase for employers with the equivalent of 10 or fewer full-time employees. Those employers would pay $5.65 an hour beginning Jan. 1, 2007; $6.65 beginning July 1, 2007; and $7.15 on July 1, 2008. Previous efforts to raise the minimum wage have stalled in the Senate, but Republicans in that chamber who support the latest version of the bill have said the exemption would ease the transition for smaller employers paying lower wages. Some House Republicans argued that the market should dictate wages and said even the compromise bill could harm small businesses. * Planks about jobs from Mark Rauterkus * Commonwealth Foundation letter about Minimum Wage to Gov. Rendell from January, 2006. * Position about minimum wage from Libertarian Party of PA * Planks about PA economy from State Rep Metcalfe * Jobs-plank-Working America, an AFL-CIO organization created for workers unable to join unions. * Gov Job Hype Rings Hollow from the Allegheny Institute, policy brief from June, 2006 & update in September, 2006 * Jobs-plank-A.I.-Nov06 from November, 2006, and the Allegheny Institute Statements * Fontana praises new minimum wage law * Blockage of Fed Min Wage Increase is a disgrace from June, 2006 from USALONE.com * Jobs-plank-Rendell, statement about minimum wage from June, 2006 * Jobs-plank-Schroder, statement about minimum wage from June, 2006 * Jobs-plank-statement-Dunkelberg, article, Minimum Rationality for Minimum Wage PA's workers' pool do NOT match the needs of area companies. A WSJ article, see the link below, stated 24% of Pennsylvania's businesses can't find qualified employees, even as 350,000 state residents are out of work. A skills gap among companies and workers makes a struggle for those here to stay. Companies are sure to move to places with a better worker pool. :"In theory, workers in a free-market economy should have plenty of incentive to remain competitive in the labor market by getting a good education and acquiring strong skills. But for some reason, that's not happening enough -- especially in heavily industrialized states like Pennsylvania that have relied for so long on manufacturing jobs that didn't require a high level of education." :Pittsburgh's Dave Copeland, journalist and blogger wrote, Right. But this isn't a free market economy. This is the People's Republic of Pennsylvania, where government pandering has created a culture of economic entitlement. It's a place where incentive to improve your skill set has been crushed, where people believe it is the government's responsibility to make sure they're gainfully employed, even if they lack the motivation to adapt to a rapidly changing, global job market. :''Coming home for my two-hour, jury duty lunch break yesterday, I took the incline up with some construction workers who were heading up to Mount Washington, apparently for lunch, from a road construction site adjacent to station square. They were enthusiastic about all the government-backed projects in the pipeline. :"And if they build that new arena, with the casinos and the hotels, they'll never be able to let us go," one said excitedly. Pittsburgh Jobs Jobs inside the city rose from about 300,000 in 1992 to 320,000 in 2001, the most recent year statistics were available. Jobs within the city tend to be premier jobs. In 2001, city jobs averaged nearly $40,000 a year in pay, compared with about $30,000 in the rest of the region. P-G article from January 2006 on job surge : Pittsburgh is not a boomtown, yet. Pointers * Blog mention of WSJ article. 24% of businesses in the state can't find enough qualified workers. * National job trend up slightly but corporate profites up more by Jerry Bowyer http://www.Bowyermedia.com. * Immigrants and Pittsburgh * Region's sluggish employment growth, a policy brief from The Allegheny Institute for Public Policy from April 18, 2006. Media * Regional Insights: Area's manufacturing smaller but still very much matters in the P-G in August, 2006 Blogs * http://gaius-democracyinamerica.blogspot.com/2007/02/undemocracy-democrat-trade-policy-and.html Free trade, treaty talk, exports and more from Feb 2007 The 2006 Pennsylvania Manufacturers' Register published by Manufacturers’ News released data saying Pennsylvania continues to lose manufacturing jobs and facilities at an annual rate of nearly 20,000 jobs and 118 factories. The city of Pittsburgh saw nearly 100 plants close or relocate to the suburbs in a five-year stretch. Over the same period, Allegheny County outside the city increased its number of factories from 1,904 to 2,715. Manufacturing in all industries continues to become ever more automated, more efficient, and less dependent on people. Innovate or disappear is also innovate and shrink. “Manufacturing will continue to decline in the number of jobs,” insists Barry Balmat, Director of the expanding Pittsburgh office of RAND. In part, he says, because of the much higher concentration of manufacturing jobs in the region that can be pruned and partly because of the simple fact that 21st century advanced manufacturing operations can produce much more product with far fewer people. Balmat also notes that there is ever-increasing competition for the same manufacturing jobs, whether that competition comes from the US Sun Belt and Northeast regions or from outsourced jobs to other countries. Another point of consideration: our country has just come through a recession so what happened here parallels other cities and, in comparison, Pittsburgh’s rate of job loss was actually lower than many others. * 77 new companies opened facilities in the Pittsburgh region in 2005, according to information tracked and compiled by the Allegheny Conference on Community Development. Of which, 17 are advanced manufacturing or manufacturing operations. The 77 new companies brought 3,200 new jobs. Then there are the expansions of existing companies or their satellites in the region last year. Approximately 8,900 jobs were created or retained in 2005 by 124 companies. * The region lost jobs in 11 of the 19 categories tracked by the Census. (according to the Pennsylvania Dept. of Labor and Industry, data collected and analyzed by the Allegheny Conference) * Educational and health services increased 5.5 percent * Professional and business services jumped by nearly four percent. * Showing improvement: leisure and hospitality was up by 3.65 percent and other services by nearly four percent. * Total non-farm employment as a whole dropped a mere half of one percent in the region, manufacturing jobs for the period tanked by almost 12 percent. Facts are Facts One very strong possible counter to these grim regional manufacturing losses proposed by Balmat suggests concentrating on the rates of reduction in manufacturing jobs and plants for the Pittsburgh area. The rate of reduction, he says “may be a greater percentage since we have more manufacturing” in the area in the first place. According to Sally Sleeper, a RAND management scientist, a study in which she’s actively involved concentrates in part on the increase of industry consolidation while at the same time factoring in the high degree of government fragmentation in the Pittsburgh region. Amazingly, Sleeper has found that there is still a mindset in many parts of the area that manufacturing will come back as it once reigned if only one of the multitude of municipal governments can just put together a better package of tax breaks and other incentives than its neighbors. Economic forecast The annual economic forecast and prior year review put out by PNC Financial Services Group states that: “Still, across the Region, manufacturing payrolls continue to slide, even in those industries seeing rapid growth in demand and enjoying some degree of pricing power. This is an indication that rapid worker productivity growth is enabling firms to meet growing demand without taking on additional workers, but also a sign that most of the job losses seen in the factory sector in recent years are permanent.” Do you realize how many people these organizations employ?! Rather than continue to express shock and gloom when each passing year yields more plant closings and more layoffs, both Balmat and Sleeper think that far more attention should be given to newer industries in which the Pittsburgh area has significant advantages. Barry Balmat points to the omnipresent University of Pittsburgh Medical Center and to Highmark Blue Cross Blue Shield. Health care and elder care are viable industries. Deal with it. Where others see the abnormally high percentage of elderly residents in the area as a sure sign of decline, Balmat sees instead a regional strength in the number and quality of health care providers and health care innovations that have sprung up to treat that same population. Although it hasn’t happened yet to the degree he expected, Balmat is certain that the Pittsburgh region will be exporting health care innovations nation- and worldwide as it used to export metals and metal-making machinery. Don't forget While job losses in any sector hurt, at least in the short run, residents of the Pittsburgh region have to remember that new companies and new industries are being created in or are moving to the area daily. Medical and tech companies continue to spin out of the University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University. In Ambridge, Beaver County an Australian real estate developer is finalizing plans for the first mixed-use office/warehouse/light industrial complex that the financially troubled town has ever seen. As Barry Balmat notes, British Nuclear Fuels-owned Westinghouse Electric Co. has been purchased by Toshiba, which will likely lead to continuing expansion and more jobs. Even beleaguered manufacturing isn’t a total loss by any means. Despite a significant percentage drop in the number of regional manufacturing jobs, there are still nearly 109,000 people in the Pittsburgh region gainfully employed in many aspects of manufacturing. :Source: Larry Slater is owner of Slater Research Services, a Pittsburgh-based market research firm.